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An example collection, so you can see what this page does. Nothing added here is kept: leaving deletes it.
Passiflora maliformis; photograph (c) Skjold Søndergaard, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Skjold Søndergaard, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2021-12-12

Passiflora maliformis L.

Conch apple; Sweet calabash; Sweet cup; Wild purple passionfruit

Passifloraceae · Cuba, Dominican Republic +7

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Passiflora maliformis, photograph (c) Miguel José Lengua Hernández, some rights reserved (CC BY)Passiflora maliformis, photograph (c) Miguel José Lengua Hernández, some rights reserved (CC BY)Passiflora maliformis, photograph (c) Miguel José Lengua Hernández, some rights reserved (CC BY)Passiflora maliformis, photograph (c) Miguel José Lengua Hernández, some rights reserved (CC BY)Passiflora maliformis, photograph (c) Miguel José Lengua Hernández, some rights reserved (CC BY)Passiflora maliformis, photograph (c) Miguel José Lengua Hernández, some rights reserved (CC BY) 15 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
14.6°C
Record low 12.6 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
25°C
Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, Aug, Sep and Oct at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
2,348mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
28–34DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in the habitat's months, not shifted
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
A sharp rainy season, March to May and September to December (the habitat's months, not shifted), in a year of even temperature. rain rule, CHELSA
Not shifted: the shift rule does not apply to this habitat. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Passiflora maliformis, the sweet calabash, conch apple, wild purple passionfruit, or sweet cup, is a smallish (5 cm or 2 in) passionfruit with purple, yellow or green skin and a greyed-yellow to orange pulp that is aromatically scented and flavoured. It is a fast-growing vine, growing best in somewhat cooler-than-tropical climates. The rind is particularly hard and tougher than most passionfruits. It is usually eaten fresh or used to flavour drinks. More on Wikipedia ›

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Passiflora maliformis", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Passiflora

Passiflora, known also as the passion flowers or passion vines, is a genus of about 550 species of flowering plants, and the type genus of the family Passifloraceae.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Passiflora", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Seasons

The rain rule reads a sharp season: 70% of the median year's rain (1,603 mm of 2,269 mm) falls in March to May and September to December. The temperature curve is flat, 1.0 °C between the warmest and coldest month, so the growing-season rule does not infer a growing season from it. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere. The habitat lies within 10° of the equator, where the shift rule does not apply, so they are not shifted for a collection elsewhere.

Rain

2,269 mm in the median year at the habitat, 1,603 mm of it March to May and September to December. Wettest month April at 273 mm, driest month August at 113 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 1,505 mm to 3,860 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 2,348 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 2,269 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, northern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 28 to 34 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 22, the highest 90th-percentile month 38).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is 14.6 °C, the absolute minimum 12.6 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 31.0 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low 17.0 °C in August (across the grid cells of the range 11.6 °C to 22.2 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 25.1 °C in March (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: 14.6 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 64 to 68% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

How this section is made

Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.

Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light. CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Temperature. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected -531 m to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Passiflora maliformis through the yearWarmest months January, February, March, April, August, September and October, mean daily high 25 °C; coldest month August, mean nightly low 17.0 °C; 2,269 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA; the extremes at the edge from NASA POWER. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.10°15°20°25°30°35°31.0° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER12.6° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 28–34RH 64–68%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 112 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low extremes over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, from NASA POWER, marked at the edge, in no month DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C25 / 20–3025 / 21–3125 / 21–3025 / 20–3024 / 20–2924 / 20–2924 / 20–3025 / 20–3025 / 20–3025 / 20–3024 / 20–2924 / 20–29
Night °C17 / 12–2218 / 13–2318 / 13–2318 / 13–2318 / 13–2318 / 13–2217 / 12–2217 / 12–2217 / 12–2217 / 13–2218 / 13–2218 / 12–22
Rain mm131 / 58–246150 / 93–273211 / 131–361273 / 164–437246 / 153–440153 / 77–381119 / 56–361113 / 49–338173 / 79–350260 / 154–391258 / 154–365182 / 81–272
DLI31 / 25–3532 / 26–3633 / 26–3730 / 24–3528 / 23–3328 / 22–3530 / 24–3633 / 26–3834 / 25–3831 / 24–3629 / 23–3330 / 23–33
RH %66 / 56–7366 / 55–7366 / 58–7367 / 61–7467 / 61–7466 / 59–7465 / 58–7364 / 56–7366 / 57–7567 / 59–7468 / 61–7567 / 59–74
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 112 grid cells holding the 136 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. A dash is a month one or more of those cells has no figure for in the grid (a variable CHELSA does not carry there), so no median is taken rather than one over fewer cells. Extremes and elevation were read at a typical spot in the range, cell 1779:2035 (1.025, -78.225). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 12.6 °C, 1st-percentile night 14.6 °C, 99th-percentile day 31.0 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Across the range: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 112 distinct grid cells holding 136 of the 136 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1779:2035 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 1.00_-78.125, lapse-corrected -531 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 1254 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across the cells of the in-range records placed well enough to read one, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeCuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Leeward Is. AB Ant, Puerto Rico, Windward Is., Venezuela, Colombia · introduced: Jawa, Fiji, Niue, New Caledonia, Samoa, Tonga, Vanuatu, Cook Is., Marquesas, Pitcairn Is., Trinidad-Tobago, Galápagos · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker2.873, -75.136 · in the densest population, 99 records (38% of those in range)
Kew's description“liana” · “wet tropical” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 258 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 136 of them placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 153 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 196 km away. 76 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 122 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 258 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Passiflora maliformis, photograph 1did not loadPassiflora maliformis, photograph 2did not loadPassiflora maliformis, photograph 3did not loadPassiflora maliformis, photograph 4did not loadPassiflora maliformis, photograph 5did not loadPassiflora maliformis, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Miguel José Lengua Hernández, some rights reserved (CC BY) (6).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Attalea amygdalina Arecaceae Urceolina bonplandii Amaryllidaceae Urceolina caucana Amaryllidaceae Lycoseris mexicana Lycoseris mexicana Asteraceae Photo: CC0, author not stated Anthurium buganum Araceae Citharexylum kunthianum Verbenaceae

Other Passiflora 145 in the reference

Passiflora actinia Passiflora actinia Wild Bell Appleˌ Photo: CC BY, fmunozPassiflora adenopoda Passiflora adenopoda Passifloraceae Photo: CC BY, Nicolás Baresch UribePassiflora adulterina Passiflora adulterina Passifloraceae Photo: CC BY, Nicolás Baresch UribePassiflora affinis Passiflora affinis Passifloraceae Photo: CC0, author not statedPassiflora alata Passiflora alata Wingstem passionflower Photo: CC BY, Mariano CosentinoPassiflora alnifolia Passiflora alnifolia Passifloraceae Photo: CC BY, Connor Connolly-MoylsPassiflora ambigua Passiflora ambigua Passifloraceae Photo: CC BY, Miguel José Lengua HernándezPassiflora amethystina Passiflora amethystina Passifloraceae Photo: CC0, Alfredo F. Fuentes Claros Passiflora anadenia Tropical passionflower Passiflora antioquiensis Passiflora antioquiensis Banana passionfruit Photo: CC0, author not statedPassiflora apetala Passiflora apetala Passifloraceae Photo: CC BY, taniaatPassiflora arida Passiflora arida Desert passionflower Photo: CC BY, Sue Carnahan all 146 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Passiflora caudata; Passiflora maliformis var. pubescens; Passiflora ornata; Passiflora ornata subsp. pubescens; Passiflora ornata var. pubescens. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Passifloraceae
Described by
L.
Native to
Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti +6
Wild records
258 in range · 153 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 12 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (9 at a botanic garden or arboretum, 2 at a herbarium, 1 at a zoo; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-22
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 1.00_-78.125, lapse-corrected -531 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-22none of the photographs on this page is credited to GBIF: those shown are other sources', and GBIF's were the same photographs or were set aside by the photograph rules
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 48 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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